Evo 9 - First impressions & maintaining the car to get the best from it

So my first impression of the car as a whole was not a great one.

I mean most of us know that Evo's are well known for their performance but this car left me with mixed emotions.
So i took it for my first brisk drive around some twisty roads up and down a mountain and the car didnt have these great manners that i expected.
It under steered when pushed, the brakes faded easily & it felt like i had to really stand on them to make them work & it really didn't have much go to it. I mean it felt heavy, cumbersome & generally left me underwhelmed.

So i took it home & thought about what to do with it. First thing was to look back at the history again & verify with the workshops that everything had been done.
As it turns out the more i talked to people who had worked on it the more it appeared that the previous owner had ran out of love for it.
So the major service was only really an oil, filter and timing belt change. So i had to rectify that if i was going to keep it.

I took it to a well known Evo specialist in Brisbane, NA Autosport & Engineering, to give it a once over & basically Nick said it needs a thorough major service, new brakes, alignment & new rear diff bushes. Nick also said it felt a little underpowered so would be best to give the injectors a clean. And that should bring the life back into it.

So i thought if I'm going to do all of this then  it really needs a brake upgrade. So the very first modification i did to this car is the brakes.
The Evo IX is a heavy car & a heavy car needs great brakes. The factory Brembo calipers are a nice piece of kit but without high temp fluid & pads they're only ever going to be good for the street. So i gave both of them the nod & i also upgraded to some better rotors & used the Dba4000 T3's front and rear and Hel braided lines.

I would normally do the brakes myself but since it was in getting all the other work done i said do it.

Once the work was done it was immediately transformed into the car it should be & once was.
After a few quick stabs of the brake pedal they were bedded in & they felt great. The car steered as it should, precise & light & the car felt a lot more willing to breathe up in the top end of the rev range.

So if anyone reading this is feeling a little underwhelmed with your Evo, give it a good service & check that everything is within spec as it does make all the difference.

So now i needed to test it out on the track to see what it's really like and what times it does compared to other cars. Stay tuned